


Don’t Do Saddness

by Riddlebird-puff (hobbitpuff)



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: But Edward is Definitely Into Oswald, Edward Is Troubled, Edward’s Hallucinations are not nice, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hugging, M/M, Mirror Edward/Riddler, Nightmares, Past Child Abuse Suggested, Platonic Bed Sharing, Pre Relationship, no riddles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-01-23
Packaged: 2019-03-08 09:42:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13455600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hobbitpuff/pseuds/Riddlebird-puff
Summary: Edward offers Oswald some comfort-“You are not alone, Oswald. I am here.”Oswald finally looks up. “Will you stay?”“I will.”





	Don’t Do Saddness

**Author's Note:**

> I finally wrote Edward’s POV.

Edward cannot sleep. The other has been growing more… restless. And his voice slips through his defenses in the quiet dark. Whispering secret carnal desires drenched in blood.

  
But the dreams are even worse.

  
_He is surrounded by Kringle’s heat. His hands around her fragile throat. He stifled her soft cries with a bruising kiss. He thrust deeper into her center. She gasped into his mouth, his hands tightened around her neck. Her hands pushed, scratched, against his chest. He opened his eyes._

  
_Impossible green eyes met his own. Black hair and pale skin with too many freckles to count. He attempted to pull out but Oswald held him tight. Oswald threw his head back and moaned. His hands tightened around Oswald’s throat. The skin under his fingers turning the same beautiful shade of purple as Oswald’s parted lips. He tried to stop his hands but they no longer belonged to him. He could only watch helplessly as Oswald spasmed under him, around him. He shuddered as Oswald struggled for breath. Oswald gasped and Ed screamed out._

  
Edward always woke then. The sound of the other’s laughter ringing in his ears. And the uncomfortable wet stickiness in his pajama pants.

  
He does not need a degree in psychology to know what the dream means. What the other is showing him. He is afraid of harming Oswald. He is afraid of the dream. He is afraid one night he will wake and it will not have been a dream.

  
So he does not sleep. If he does not sleep he cannot dream.

  
Edward looks at the clock. It is too late to still be up but too early to be awake.

  
He throws on his robe, one of the few luxuries he has kept from his time from before Oswald. It is well worn and still smells of his apartment. It does not belong here. Just like him.

  
Edward opens the bedroom door and steps out into the hall trying to be quiet. He is not sneaking around. He just does not want to have to explain himself to any of Oswald’s people.

  
He will go to the kitchen and make a cup of tea and return to his room to wait for the long morning. Alone. But never alone.

  
He does not realize he has gone the wrong way until he finds himself outside of Oswald’s bedroom.

  
_Lie to yourself if you must but I know the truth, the other speaks_. And Edward knows if he turns around he would see him in the mirror behind him.

  
He is about to walk away when he hears a strangled cry behind the closed door. The sound is so much like the dream that he wonders if he had fallen asleep without realizing it.

  
_The other Edward bit Oswald’s lip. The taste of his blood filled his mouth. It tasted… delicious._

  
The other does not like Oswald. He calls him a weakness. He says he cannot be trusted. He will betray your trust like all the others. I am the only one you can trust. I will never betray you. But Edward knows something that the other does not realize he has figured out.

  
The other is afraid of Oswald.

  
Another cry comes from the other side of the door. Edward puts his ear to the door but he can hear no other sound except for his own breathing. He places his palm against the door and knocks softly.

  
“Mr. Cobblepot… Oswald?”

  
“Go. Away. Nygma.”

  
Edward frowns. Oswald’s voice sounds funny. It sounds strained. And there is a pause between each word as though Oswald is struggling for breath.

  
_The other moved down Oswald’s body and took him between his lips. He felt Oswald buckle into his mouth. He tasted the salty bitterness on his tongue. The other looked up into the mirror behind Oswald and Edward saw himself. The other smiled around the organ in his mouth and bit down…_

  
Oswald cries out.

  
“Oswald!” Edward puts his hand on the doorknob. “I’m coming in.” He turns the knob knowing it will not be locked. He opens the door a crack. The light is on. “Is everything alright?”

  
“Edward.” He can hear Oswald’s quiet sniffles. “I don’t want you to see me like this.”

  
Oswald’s voice sounds strangled. Almost as though someone has their hands around his gorgeous throat, mmm Eddie, the other giggles.

  
The thought that the other him could harm Oswald is ridiculous. Edward knows the other is only a faction of his own fractured mind. He knows. But he needs to see that Oswald has not been harmed with his own eyes.

  
He opens the door.

  
Oswald sits on the edge of his bed. His usually pale face is dark with red splotches, hiding his freckles. He is panting. And his slim chest is heaving under his silk pajamas. The top buttons have become undone as though he has clawed at his throat.

  
_The other stood on his knees on the bed behind Oswald. He placed a hand on Oswald’s bare throat and put his mouth below his ear. He placed his other hand on the other side of Oswald’s throat and looked up at Edward. He winked_.

  
“Stop!”

  
“Edward?” Oswald asks confused. “What are you doing in here?”

  
Edward shakes his head and the other is gone as though he had never been there. But he knows better.

  
“I heard you cry out.”

  
“You heard me cry out, from your room?”

  
“No. I was walking past your door.”

  
_He knows. You were listening at the door like a creeper, Eddie._

  
“I woke unable to move my knee. And it would seem I am having some problem putting the brace on.” Oswald lifts the complicated device from behind his back. “My mother always did this for me. I have never had to do it on my own.”

  
“You should have called for me. I would have come.”

  
_Would’ve come running, right Eddie? Any chance to lick Mister Penguin’s boots, isn’t that right?_

  
“Didn’t want you to see me like this, weak.”

  
“It’s not weakness to ask for help, Oswald.” Edward kneels in front of him. “I should have foreseen that the tour would be too strenuous on your leg.”

  
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

  
“You couldn’t have known.” Oswald looks away. “And I must say it was a rather pleasant diversion from the usual mundane mayoral duties. Especially in the company of the most knowledgeable guide on the subject.”

  
“The boy was hardly knowledgeable. All he did was read twenty year old facts from a brochure that was outdated ten years before it was written.”

  
“I did not mean that fool boy, Edward. I was speaking of you.”

  
“Oh. An interest in ancient embalming practices came in handy with my previous profession. To be honest it’s a subject that has always fascinated me.” He shrugs. “Most people find it morbid.”

  
“You should know by now, we are not most people, Edward.” Oswald chuckles. “And I am fairly certain we can find a use for your special interest in your new line of work as well.”  
“Indeed.” He smiles. “Let me see your leg.”

  
Edward has seen Oswald’s bad leg before, but he has never inquired about the cause. And Oswald has not volunteered the information. Not that he is ashamed of it. He does not attempt to hide it. And he holds his head up defiantly as Edward takes his bare foot in his hands.

  
The angry knot that twists Oswald’s knee suggests an old injury that had healed badly. Probably while he had still been a young boy and not yet finished growing.

  
Oswald has only ever spoken of his dear mother in the most loving of terms but he cannot help but wonder if she had been somehow to blame. And Oswald’s fierce devotion to his mother was in part some sort of misplaced guilt.

  
Or perhaps he is allowing his own family history taint his thoughts.

  
Without thought he began to rub the reddened scar tissue. The skin beneath his fingers is rough to the touch but somehow more sensitive for being so.

  
The Penguin does not let anyone else see this side of him and Edward finds that knowledge empowering.

  
“Had you ever given any thought to becoming a doctor?”

  
Edward looks up at Oswald in confusion. “Why I would I wish to be a doctor?”

  
“I had just thought with the way you nursed me back to health the way that you did that you have some talent in the healing arts.”

  
“I am not… good with people.”

  
“Maybe not people, but I would argue your hands are good with penguins.” Oswald turns red and bites his lip.

  
Edward pauses afraid of causing Oswald pain. “Am I causing you more distress?”

  
“Quite the opposite, my friend.” Oswald chuckles. “Perhaps you have a future in veterinarian medicine instead.”

  
“As a boy I wanted to be a vet.” But when his father had caught him attempting to fix the neighbor’s cat that had been struck by car that had put an end to that. “My father wanted me to follow in his footsteps and join the police force.”

  
Edward could see Oswald file the slip he had just made in his mind for later. He does not speak of his time before Gotham for a good reason. But Oswald is both clever enough and resourceful enough to unearth his secrets if he were not more careful.

  
“What of you?”

  
“I’m afraid you will laugh at me, Edward. But I wanted to be the king of Gotham. I wanted power and everyone to respect me.” Oswald pauses. “And my mother never discouraged me. She always supported my dream, as impossible as it must have seemed. She encouraged me to study politics and law. She told me, Oswald that is where the real power of this world is to be had.”

  
“And now look at where you are.”

  
“Look at where we both are. I would not be here without you, Edward.” Oswald looks away, and there are tears in his eyes. “My mother would have liked it here. And I like to think she would have liked you too.”

  
Oswald had quite obviously loved his mother with all of his heart. And, at least, believed she had loved him just as much if not more. The idea is foreign to Edward. But he finds himself a little sorry that he would never meet the woman that had shaped Oswald into the man he is.

  
“I think… I would have liked her too.”

  
Oswald nods. He is crying Edward notices but is unsure what he is supposed to do. He freezes, his hands unmoving on Oswald’s knee.

  
“I have the throne. But it feels empty without someone to share it with.”

  
Oswald’s shoulders shudder with silent tears.

  
“My mother. My father. Even Fish.” Oswald laughs, a little hysterically Edward thinks. “I am alone.” He wraps his arms around himself and rocks.

  
Edward understands. The night is always the worst.

  
He thinks of a small boy hiding from his father in the closet, his arms around himself, alone, wishing, imagining that someone held him safe in their arms.

  
Edward takes a seat next to Oswald on the bed and grabs the smaller man into a crushing hug. He feels Oswald wrap his arms around him, bringing them even closer together.

  
Safe. Edward thinks. He feels safe in Oswald’s arms in a way he never had with Kringle. Oswald heaves against his chest and Edward begins to rub his back in comfort.

  
Edward does not know how long they remain like this. But he knows peace he has not known since the other has returned. And the only sound is Oswald’s quiet sobbing.

  
Finally Oswald pulls away. He rubs his eyes.

  
“I fear I owe you an apology, Edward. Please return to your room and forget this ever happened.”

  
Oswald still has not looked him in the eye. Embarrassed. Ashamed of showing his weakness.  
“You are not alone, Oswald. I am here.”

  
Oswald finally looks up. “Will you stay?”

  
“I will.”

  
Edward lays down with Oswald. It is not the first time he has shared a bed with the man. But they have not shared a bed since his apartment.

  
He does not move away when Oswald lays his head on his shoulder, and Edward can tell the mayor has fallen asleep by his even breathing.

  
Edward closes his eyes. The other is silent.  


 

**Author's Note:**

> This site is fighting against me tonight - so sorry if there’s any errors in the format.
> 
> It might not have been obvious but - Edward’s other self is afraid of Oswald because when Edward is touching Oswald he can’t appear to Edward.
> 
> This actually turned out quite different than I had planned but I’m satisfied with it.
> 
> Thank you for reading.


End file.
